Mr. Feargal Ó Coigligh:

Deputy Ó Broin has put his finger on the nub of the Bill. Section 2 is a very general provision and states that notwithstanding anything else in the law nothing shall prevent a local authority issuing a licence. The provision opens the door very wide and poses a danger. The provision is then pulled back when it is stipulated that the provision is controlled by regulation.

One could work with the Bill but as people are probably very much aware now in terms of the approach to legislation these days, following judgments by the Supreme Court, legislation must set out policies and principles. We would need to do a lot of work on the Bill to set out the policies and principles around which the Minister would make regulations. We are no longer allowed to legislate saying that the Minister can just go away and make regulations on anything. That has been found out. We need to be clear in this piece of legislation regarding what the regulations will cover and what is the framework within which the regulations operate. That will then bring one to a simple premise that the regulations must ensure that people's health and the environment are protected. That would be the context in which regulations are developed.

The regulations would then bring us to a point where the Minister would probably pass the EPA without developing the relevant standards to ensure that discharges do not impact on our health and environment. That brings us back to where we are now, which is codes of practice and regulatory regimes that are designed to ensure that health and the environment are not impacted. I suspect we could do a huge amount of work and spend a huge amount of time on legislating but that would not actually bring us any further than what the current legal position is. What we suggested when we met last week was to have greater technical discussions between the county council, ourselves and the EPA and see where that brings us. If those discussions find that legislative or regulatory tweaks are required then that could inform how we would approach the matter in the future. There could be tweaks within the existing code without the need for new legislation.

Indeed, as we see, even within the current regime as Dr. Ryan outlined, the EPA is already, through the new guidelines that are being developed, allowing for new technologies that will give greater scope. That is a slightly convoluted answer to say that by the time we go through a significant legislation process we may not actually progress the issue a huge amount whereas if we, the EPA and the county council work closely through guidelines we may help to resolve issues in some of these areas.